Editor’s Note

Dear Fellow Space Elevator Enthusiast,

There are so many ways to contact ISEC. I intend to add a new segment to the next newsletter at the very end merely called “Contact Us” and list all of the ways to contact us, there. Just to give you an idea, I’ll list some of them here, ending with a treasure hunt for finding things on our new and improved website.

You can find us on Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, LinkedIn, Instagram, and check out our new YouTube channel! 

While you are there, don't forget to subscribe to the channel and click “like” for the videos.

Have you SEEN the new website? It has been up and running for a couple of months, now, with improvements being made continually.

This month we added recordings of our webinars to our website:

https://www.isec.org/recorded-webinars

So, about that treasure hunt. Here are some other items to search for while you are there:

Peter Robinson’s research on space elevator climbers has a new sub-heading called “Climber Engineering” under the Research tab.

Michael Fitzgerald’s Architectural Notes have their own sub-category called “Architect’s Notes” in the Resources tab.

Our regular installment of “Why Space Elevators” in the ISEC newsletter has now been incorporated into its own page on the website under the About tab. Some have already been added, more shall come soon, but there are some on the website that have not yet been published in the newsletter. Look for the most recent one, below, from our own Space Elevator Architect, Michael Fitzgerald, and look for his one-liner, already on the website!

And, there’s much more…happy hunting!

Sandee Schaeffer
Newsletter Editor


President's Corner

by Pete Swan

Karyn Gleeson Joins ISEC Board

We at ISEC are very pleased to announce our newest Board of Director's Member. Her title will be "Director of Online Events." She has been an active supporter for some time now and deserves to be recognized for her contributions. She has described her history as:

My Learning & Development bio: Karyn Gleeson is the Online Events Production Manager for The Learning Guild, where  she manages both the tactical needs of producing online events as well as the strategic needs of managing the staff and event deliverables. In addition, Karyn serves as a consultant and produces and/or designs online events for organizations, that range from webinars to virtual classroom instruction. Previously, Karyn was an LMS administrator and manager of the technical support staff for an online curriculum provider. She has years of experience as a business analyst, project manager, and trainer for a custom software development firm. She continues to provide educational support to parents, educators, and students of the K-12 community through workshops, small group instruction, and online classes.

Karyn Gleeson

Her responsibilities will be consistent with her past support to ISEC and her innovative ideas on how to better reach out from ISEC.  Please welcome Karyn to our community of space elevator enthusiasts. 

Keep Climbing!

Pete


July Webinar

The next ISEC webinar is on July 17th (see https://www.isec.org/events for details) and will be given by ISEC Vice President Dr. Dennis Wright. "How Space Elevators Work: Physics Concepts" is the topic and the goal of the talk is to boost an intuitive understanding of the basic ideas of space elevator physics.

Some of the questions to be discussed are:

  • What holds the space elevator up?

  • What will the tether look like?

  • What happens when the space elevator is disturbed in some way?

  • How do the motions of tether climbers affect the tether?

  • How do the atmospheric, electromagnetic and radiation environments in which the space elevator operates affect its motion?

The talk will not be technical (no equations!) and is aimed at a general audience. There will be ample opportunities to ask questions and comment. To register for this webinar, please see above link.


Why Space Elevators

by Michael A. Fitzgerald

Why am I involved in Space Elevators?

It depends on one’s views.

The Rear View -- Achievements since 2013

The Horizon View -- It is closer than you think

The Rear View & the Horizon View of the Galactic Harbour

An Update

I wrote the paragraphs below about 9 or 10 months ago. In the time since, my ideas and ideals have not changed one iota. I have conquered two cancers and am fighting off the third. I faced the worldwide pandemic like the rest of you, with the cancer doctor telling me clearly that I have underlying conditions. I have seen the bad acts by those who should be protecting us and by those protesting. I continue work on our Galactic Harbour because it is a good thing. We must do good.

Where are the Buffalo Springfield and their immortal lyrics, commenting on the riots of the 1960’s? Their lyrics -- Now 54 years old, are worth a moment of thought by all of us, in today’s times.

Their Lyrics ♫ ♫

There's something happening here
What it is ain't exactly clear …
Paranoia strikes deep,
Into your life it will creep
It starts when you're always afraid …

We at ISEC and at Galactic Harbour Associate, INC will proceed; thoughtful but unafraid.

The Rear View – Achievements since 2013

The ISEC has had an impact. In the last 7 years, the technical maturity and engineering substance of the Space Elevator has solidified and become organized; most notably as the Galactic Harbour. ISEC’s Technology Development and Maturation approach has melded a better definition of the Space Elevator Engineering solution(s).

The Elevator is no longer a mystery. Engineering approaches for the Tether Climber, the Earth Port, the GEO Region, and the Apex Anchor have been expressed in terms everyone understands: a harbor. The last technology hurdle -- strong material for the tether -- was conquered.

The Galactic Harbour is a triad of change; 1) a transportation force in the future; 2) an enabler of robust space-based enterprise; and 3) the initial infrastructure of the 3rd dimension of Earth’s transportation and logistics system. We have talked and talked; and now openly embrace these changes. The Galactic Harbour…where transportation & business will meet.

The Horizon View -- It is more important than you think

In the near term, our major objective will be to improve the descriptive portrayals of the Horizon View and reach even broader audiences. We will portray this robust, amalgam of transportation and enterprise to attract investors, partners, educators, and supporters. At the future horizon, the Galactic Harbour will support enterprise activities along the GEO belt, factories and solar power generation near GEO, efficient interplanetary departures from the Apex, and earthbound products and materials arriving at the Earth Port. The Earth Port becomes a valued nexus of trade. On orbit, businesses will flourish, satellites will be repaired and refueled, solar power collection systems will be assembled, and interplanetary journeys will be launched. Beyond the horizon, several Galactic Harbours will operate, expanding Earth’s infrastructure to access space and melding it with the entire, diverse, mosaic of space. We will learn what God has in store for us.

I want to be around

Michael A. Fitzgerald


Student Essay Competition

2nd Summit for Space Sustainability 

Concept:  Present a paper at a virtual conference suggesting a Permanent Space Access Infrastructure (Space Elevator) would positively impact the questions being addressed. There is a tremendous amount of support material available upon publishing of 2020 ISEC Study reports (Interplanetary Mission Support - July 15 publish - and Assured Survivability - pdf on ISEC website).

"The Secure World Foundation is excited to announce a student essay competition in conjunction with our 2nd Summit for Space Sustainability. Space sustainability is recognized as a priority issue among many policymakers and space practitioners. Building on the success of the inaugural Summit in 2019, this year’s Summit for Space Sustainability will focus on the progress being made in improving space sustainability and the gaps and challenges that remain."

https://swfound.org/news/all-news/2020/06/2nd-summit-for-space-sustainability-student-essay-competition

Note:  Dr. Swan would love to "mentor" any student through this process. Contact him at pete.swan@isec.org


History Corner

by David Raitt

NASA’s Interest in and Funding of Space Elevators

Editor’s Note: This is the second part of two parts due to length. For the first part, see the June 2020 issue.

Lunar and Mars Elevators

In 1972, an individual named James Cline wrote to NASA with a proposal for a Mooncable, built up from a small ‘seed’ tether, which he believed would be a profitable space transportation system and a good follow-on project after Apollo. In his document he briefly presented the fundamental transportation project together with a set of engineering concepts which might be used to implement the siphon-like system. In the event, NASA declined to take up Cline’s Mooncable conceptual idea partly because of unsubstantiated assertions and technical risks and partly because their funding priorities lay elsewhere.

However, besides funding Brad Edwards seminal concept for an Earth space elevator (in his Phase II report for NIAC, Edwards also discussed a Mars elevator), NIAC has also funded studies for both a lunar elevator and a martian one. The idea of a lunar space elevator idea was introduced in a 1979 paper by Jerome Pearson. This was an extension of the classical space elevator idea, using the Earth-Moon Lagrangian points as balance points instead of the stationary orbit around a single body. The concept of a lunar anchored satellite offered the promise of bringing lunar materials into high Earth orbit, much more cheaply than with rockets.

With a NIAC grant, Pearson and colleagues released a Phase I final technical report in 2005. The lunar space elevator was proposed as a revolutionary way to facilitate development of cislunar space. Such an elevator would use solar-powered robotic climbing vehicles to bring lunar resources from the lunar surface to the L1 Lagrangian point, where spaceships would transfer the lunar material into high Earth orbit. The lunar space elevator would thus serve as a highway linking Earth orbit and the Moon, bringing lunar products to Earth orbit, and carrying supplies from Earth orbit to lunar bases.

Pearson’s Phase I results showed the feasibility of the lunar space elevator, in that it could be constructed with available materials, technological advances commensurate with current plans for return to the Moon, and fitting into the timeframe of the NASA Moon-Mars initiative. In 2017, Pearson submitted a further proposal to NIAC for a lunar space elevator.

Although he may have come up with the idea of a lunar space elevator, Pearson was not the first to obtain NIAC funding for a lunar transport system. Between November 1998 and 30 April 1999, Robert P. Hoyt of Tethers Unlimited, Inc carried out a Phase I study funded by NIAC into a “Cislunar Tether Transport System”. This was followed up by a further NIAC Phase II study from August 1999 to July 2001 into “MMOST - Moon and Mars Orbiting Spinning Tether Transport”. The Phase I effort developed a design for a cislunar tether transport system that used one tether in elliptical, equatorial Earth orbit and one tether in low lunar orbit. Using currently available tether materials, such a system would require a total mass of less than 28 times the mass of the payloads it could handle. Thus, a fully reusable tether system would be competitive after only two trips and would provide large cost savings for frequent round-trip travel. The Phase I effort also developed a conceptual design for a tether system for rapid Earth-Mars travels. In the Phase II effort, these system designs were combined and improved to develop a tether transportation architecture could provide low-cost transport to the Moon, Mars, and elsewhere in the solar system.

NASA’s Fun and Games

NASA Centennial Challenges were initiated in 2005 to directly engage the public in the process of advanced technology development. The program offered incentive prizes to generate revolutionary solutions to problems of interest to NASA and the nation. The program sought innovations from diverse and non-traditional sources. Competitors were not supported by government funding and awards were only made to successful teams when the challenges were met. There were several of these Challenges: Astronaut Glove, Regolith Excavation, Green Flight, Power Beaming and Strong Tether.

Since two of these Challenges, Power Beaming and Strong Tether, involved technologies having a direct application in the construction and operation of a space elevator, Ben Shelef, co-founder of the Spaceward Foundation, had the idea to leverage these two challenges into an event they titled ‘The Space Elevator Games’. The Spaceward Foundation was a non-profit organization, co-founded by Ben and Meekk Shelef in 2003, dedicated to furthering space science and technology in education and in the public mindset. The Foundation wanted to achieve the goal of breaking the space program out of Earth orbit and into worthy destinations. To this end they approached NASA with the idea of funding a Space Elevator prize and less than a year later they were allocated a $400,000 prize purse for advances in tether strength and power beaming.

NASA awarded the Spaceward Foundation a license to organize these two Challenges - though Spaceward preferred to call the Strong Tether and Power Beaming competitions the ‘Space Elevator Games’. In accordance with how NASA organized its Challenges, Spaceward would devise the rules for each of the two Space Elevator Challenges, procure a competition venue, recruit the competitors, and coordinate all of the activities for each event. NASA would review and approve the rules and, if there were any winners, award them prize money based on the Challenge results. NASA also provided administration and consulting expertise and some advertising as well. On 22 March 2005, NASA announced the first two Centennial Challenges would be released by NASA and its partner the Spaceward Foundation.

During this agreement with NASA, several sets of competition events were held with rules and conditions becoming increasingly more difficult. Both the Power Beaming Challenge and the Strong Tether Challenge events were held in 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2009. In 2005 both Challenges were held at the NASA Ames facility in California, and at different venues in subsequent years. For the 2005 event, NASA provided a $100,000 prize purse ($50,000 for each of the two Challenges). Despite there being no winner in 2005, NASA increased this to $400,000 ($200,000 for each Challenge) in 2006. In 2007, NASA further increased this amount to $1 million and for 2009 NASA provided a total prize purse of $4 million for the two Challenges. No prize money was awarded in the first three events, though in the last event -- a prize of $900,000 was given to Seattle-based Lasermotive for its efforts in the Power Beaming Challenge.

Unfortunately, NASA decided not to renew these two particular Challenges, despite persistent efforts from the International Space Elevator Consortium to get them to renew at least the Strong Tether Challenge. NASA does, however, still run a Centennial Challenge program and currently there are four Challenges: 3D-Printed Habitat; Cube Quest; Space Robotics; and Vascular Tissue.

Coverage of the first Challenges or Space Elevator Games in 2005 had drawn worldwide interest and resulted in 20 teams registering for the 2006 event, including the first non-North American entries and this interest continued in subsequent years. The NASA Centennial Challenges pushed technologies towards the space elevator developmental needs and inspired similar sponsored space elevator competitions around the world, including Europe, the USA and Japan.

Although the Games were held in 2010 and 2011, there was some interest in holding one more set of competitions in 2012, but ultimately this did not happen. However, although NASA stopped sponsoring the Challenges in 2009, the Games still continue in one form or another to this day, notably in the USA, sponsored by the International Space Elevator Consortium (ISEC) and in Japan, sponsored by the Japan Space Elevator Association (JSEA).

NASA and Science Fiction

In 2011 NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center announced it was teaming up with publisher Tor/Forge Books to develop and publish NASA-Inspired Works of Fiction. The program is designed to pair up scientists and writers to produce science-literate SF for a general audience, while making the public more aware of NASA’s role. The books are intended to highlight concepts relevant to current and future NASA missions. The first NASA-Inspired Work of Fiction book in the series was entitled “Pillar to the Sky” and written by William Forstchen. The NASA engineer who consulted on the book was Dr Hohn Panek. And it was all about a space elevator! 

Published in early 2014, the novel follows the journey of Gary and Eva Morgan, a pair of married scientists at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. They dream of building a pillar (as their space elevator is known) to the sky not least to escape an Earth of pandemic drought, sky high oil prices, and dwindling energy supplies, with a view to mining the power of the sun to provide limitless energy for humankind. When the budget for their space elevator is cut by a skeptical and bureaucratic U.S. Congress, they have to find another way of making their dream become reality. A billionaire private investor comes to their rescue, however, the path to building a sustainable space elevator will not be easy with endless battles to fight and obstacles to overcome along the way. Forstchen’s book appears to be the first and last book in the series.

Brad Edwards noted that although Arthur C. Clark had put together an interesting tale of the construction of the first space elevator in Fountains of Paradise and Kim Stanley-Robinson had a different and well-thought out view on how the first space elevator might arise in Red Mars, these science fiction books pointed out many of the basic aspects and challenges of building a space elevator and keeping it operational, but their models for building a space elevator in reality were not really within the realm of practicality.

In both of the novels a natural object, asteroid or moon, is moved into a proper orbit and mined for its carbon. This carbon is then used to build a very strong, very large cable extending both upward and downward. This approach was also considered a reasonable conceptual suggestion for one possible construction method in the David Smitherman’s 2000 study on the space elevator for NASA. Edwards, however, believed this method of dragging an asteroid about was too expensive and too difficult to be a viable option outside of science fiction.

It is worth adding here an interesting fact concerning Arthur C. Clarke. Jeffrey A. Hoffman, flew on STS-75 (February 22 to March 9, 1996) on the Shuttle Columbia which had as one of its principal payloads the reflight of NASA’s Tethered Satellite System. The TSS successfully demonstrated the ability of tethers to produce electricity and the experiment produced a wealth of new information on the electrodynamics of tethers and plasma physics. In the Oral History Transcript of his interview on 17 November 2010 as part of the NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, Hoffman had this to say:

“I remember I had had a correspondence with Arthur [C.] Clarke at the time. He had written the book Fountains of Paradise, which was about the space elevator. In fact in the most recent edition of that book he mentioned our flight because the tethers were the first step towards a space elevator. I remember one of the questions we got in the press conference was, “With all the problems you’ve had with this tether, why do it?”

We had actually flown a copy of Clarke’s book which we signed in space and we gave it to him later on. I was able to pull out the book, and I said, “This is why. Because someday we’re going to have a space elevator, and this is the technology that’s going to make it possible. Even though we had a failure here [the tether broke at 19.7km, just short of the 20.7km goal], ultimately it’s still worth doing.” Which I still believe. Unfortunately it was, I think, the nail in the coffin for tethers as far as NASA was concerned because they lost their appetite for any further demonstrations, which is a shame because I think there is a lot that can be done with tether technology and I’m sure at some point will come back.”

Conclusion

This short article has given an insight into NASA’s involvement into space elevators - mainly as a funding agency through its NASA Institute for Advance Concepts. NIAC funded the early studies of Brad Edwards who provided the baseline architecture for the modern-day space elevator. The subsequent discussion and research reduced the significant issues he addressed inside the NASA community to develop achievable solutions.

By bringing his NASA-funded ideas into the public domain and thus broadening the concept beyond the space community, Edwards encourage others to jump into the fray. Subsequently, NASA and/or its Institute for Advanced Concepts provided funding for the Smitherman, Edwards, Pearson and Hoyt studies of space elevator (including lunar and Martian) concepts, as well as Centennial Challenges in power beaming and strong tethers. The results of this interest and funding demonstrated a practical methodology for constructing space elevators, and advanced material research has improved the prognosis while shortening the forecast for successful establishment of this capability.


A Thought Experiment

by Pete Swan

One of the significant achievements of ISEC has been the continuous build-up of knowledge for the space elevator community.  The leadership has always found that there are many people around the world, and focused inside ISEC, who are working to build a Body of Knowledge.  This will ensure that when the space elevator is supported, it can start from a high level of engineering and architectural preparation.  Much of this is shown in the citations and references on our website under resources. Two remarkable components to this Body of Knowledge are being developed as this newsletter goes to press. (1) Galactic Harbours Enable Interplanetary Missions - (to be published in July), and (2) Beneficial Environmental Impacts of Space Elevators (to be published in December).

These have come together because authors are pulling together thoughts supported by research into interplanetary mission support and the environmentally friendly approach to space access. This is presented in the historic form of a "Thought Experiment." 

A NEW Paradigm has emerged: "Space Elevators are Ready for Prime Time"

•  Space Elevators can be accomplished because we now have a material

•  Space Elevators ENABLE Interplanetary Missions

o  Fast Transit to Mars (as short as 61 days, with variations out to 400+)

o  Can release towards Mars EVERY day (no 26 month wait)

o  Can move massive amounts of cargo (180,000 MTs/year to GEO and beyond)

•  Space Elevators are Earth Friendly

o  Space Solar Power replaces hundreds of coal power plants

o  No rocket exhaust to contribute to global warming

o  No additional space debris

o  Opens up remarkable commercial enterprises at Earth Port, GEO Region +

•  Offer to all future planetary or astrophysics scientists

o  Any size science experiment

o  Any solar system destination

o  Releases every day towards multiple destinations

How can this be possible? Simple -- a working Space Elevator defeats gravity and the traditional rocket equation. Massive payloads to Apex Anchor, raised by electricity, to be released at 7.76 km/sec towards destinations daily, routinely, safely and robustly while being environmentally friendly.


Appreciation Notes

by Michael Fitzgerald

Author Valentin Elías Pineda has been working on a treatise that he calls the Basics of Futurism (BoF). He uses a number of current and expected trends to understand what might happen in this century. About 2 years ago he “connected” with ISEC (Michael Fitzgerald and Pete Swan) asking about Space Elevator work. He is using our documentation and interchanges with him as discussion of how trends, seen now, might adjust with new technologies & systems; averting Malthusian events. 

Some of his comments about Elevators in early drafts of BoF:

1. Space Elevators will be the main key technology to be used to revert this expected new Malthusian situation.

2. The greatest contribution to solve the foreseen problems for XXI century on its overall extent. This technology whose extreme development will always be benefitting is Space Elevators.

3. In order to achieve a high degree of Space colonization, low cost access to space is an absolutely essential requirement.

4. Galactic Harbours do not sum Space Elevator capabilities, they multiply them

Valentin is producing Basics of Futurism en Espanol,and working on the English version in parallel -- not a minor task!!

The Author:
Valentín Elías Pineda
Technology and Futurism
C/Gornal 13, bajo derecha
08800 Vilanova i la Geltrú
Barcelona SPAIN
T. 93 408 96 40
Email: info@soleas.org
www.soleas.org


Exciting Lectures to National Space Society Chapters

by Pete Swan

I have recently participated as the main lecturer in two hour-long Zoom webinars with two separate chapters of the National Space Society (NSS). Each had their own agenda and invited me to lecture on the status of the space elevator. I thoroughly enjoyed both opportunities to share our vision of where we are going within the space elevator and Galactic Harbour architectures. They were:

May 14th, “Space Elevator Enterprises Mature into Galactic Harbour's vision of Earth-Moon Econosphere!” (St. Louis NSS Chapter)

June 18th, "Today's Space Elevator Has a Connection to an L5 Colony" (Huntsville NSS Chapter HAL5)

Both were rewarding with 45-minute lectures and over 30 minutes of questions and answers. Both were intriguing in that I was addressing individuals usually outside of the space elevator community but interested in the space community. I had fun at both and was challenged by the quick and intense questions that were tossed my way. I believe we have started to pass the word that space elevators are essential to movement off planet with arenas such as this -- webinars -- outside of our comfort zone. However, I really enjoyed the challenge of the second one, which focused upon the L5 mission of creating a colony off-planet (grown into the NSS mission of course). The concept, the focus for a generation, was to have a rotating torus colony for 10,000 people at the L5 location trailing the Moon by 60 degrees in its orbit.

I especially enjoyed showing how the leveraging of space elevators altered their complete concept of "how to" build a floating torus for 10,000 people -- making it achievable. The original idea, shown in so many references and developed into many pathways to achieve the mission, had 11,000,000 metric tons delivered to the L5 location. However, 10,000,000 of those tons would come from the manufacturing of all major segments of the colony on the Moon with only one tenth coming from the surface of the Earth. As such, the idea was to first create a colony on the Moon to develop solar cells from the silica, radiation protection shells from the regoligth, and batteries from all the minerals on the surface of the Moon. In other words, delay any movement to the L5 colony until the Moon is thriving and can divert its essential development capabilities from supporting its own development to creating another colony elsewhere. This was the only way to achieve a colony at the L5 location because gravity still restricts moving off-planet with any real mass capability. The rocket equation dominates.

This led to my presentation of "direct assembly at L5, manufacturing on Earth, with delivery by space elevators." New research (to be published by 15 July, in 2020 ISEC study entitled Galactic Harbours Enable Interplanetary Missions) shows how the architecture of space elevators can deliver over 170,000 metric tons of payloads for interplanetary missions. This can easily support the development of a Colony at the L5 Lagrangian Point in a timely manner while supporting the dreams of so many L5-ers (now NSS members). We can have a colony at L5 because of a robust permanent space transportation infrastructure with daily, routine, safe, inexpensive, and Earth friendly access to GEO and beyond.

This presentation showed how the space elevator infrastructure can change the way people think about access to space by conquering the rocket equation. As such, we need to be ever present in the discussions about how to fulfill our dreams. I am a big believer in the need for us to remain committed to our quest (big windmill?) as we enable movement off-planet. I agree with Stephen Hawking as he has stated:

"I don't think the human race will survive the next thousand years, unless we spread into space. There are too many accidents that can befall life on a single planet. But I'm an optimist. We will reach out to the stars." Interview with Daily Telegraph 2001.

The first NSS Chapter webinar, "Space Elevator enterprises mature into Galactic Harbour's vision of Earth-Moon Econosphere!” can be seen at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NcsKmY-6lhk

The second webinar, "Today's Space Elevator Has a Connection to an L5 Colony" is still not available, but will be soon.  


European Space Elevator Challenge

https://euspec.warr.de/


Do you make purchases through Amazon? 

Did you know that Amazon pays .5% of eligible purchases to a charity of your choice from a list of over one million charities? Did you know that ISEC is one of those to choose from? Consider shopping using smile.amazon.com, and when you do, consider making us the recipient of your donation. Our unique charity link for Amazon Smile is https://smile.amazon.com/ch/80-0302896.


Upcoming Events

How Space Elevators Work: Physics Concepts

Webinar sponsored by ISEC
https://www.isec.org/events
Friday, July 17th, 2020 2:00 PM to 3:00 PM UTC

SPECxROC 2020: Japan

http://www.jsea.jp/technology/specxroc/000529.html
****Postponed****
Sponsored by the Japanese Space Elevator Association

European Space Elevator Challenge (EUSPEC) 2020

https://euspec.warr.de/
Monday, September 14th through Thursday, September 17th, 2020
Technical University, Garching Campus
Munich, Germany
Team registration ends April 30th

71st International Astronautical Congress

****Postponed to 2021**** (see 72nd, below)
http://iac2020.org/ (contains postponement information)

New Strong Materials for Space Applications

Sponsored by the British Interplanetary Society
https://www.bis-space.com/2020/02/06/23917/new-strong-materials-for-space-applications
****Postponed****
TBD in 2021 (Originally July 7, 2020)
Graphene Engineering Innovation Centre, (GEIC)
Manchester, UK

International Space Development Conference (ISDC)

Sponsored by the National Space Society
Friday, May 28th through Sunday, May 30th, 2021

72nd International Astronautical Congress

Sponsored by the International Astronautical Federation (IAF)
http://www.iafastro.org/events/iac/iac-2021/
Monday, October 25th through Friday, October 29th, 2021
Dubai World Trade Center
Dubai, UAE